The present invention relates to fixing devices that fix toner images formed on paper, and to image forming apparatuses including the same.
This type of fixing device is applied in image forming apparatuses that use methods such as electrography, electrostatic recording, and magnetography or the like, and sandwich between a pair of fixing rollers a paper (such as plain paper, electrostatic recording paper, and photographic papers or the like) on which a toner image has been formed, thereby applying heat and pressure to fix the toner image onto the paper.
In these fixing devices, the paper sometimes winds around the fixing roller, and therefore the tip of a peeling claw is kept in contact with the fixing roller such that any paper that has wound around the fixing roller is peeled off by this peeling claw.
However, when a paper blockage (jam) occurs in the vicinity of the peeling claw of the fixing roller and transport of the paper stacks up, the paper sometimes strongly pushes the peeling claw against the surface of the fixing roller, thereby damaging the surface of the fixing roller or damaging the peeling claw.
For this reason, in JP 2002-14565A and JP 2002-145503A, a holder of the peeling claw (separation claw) is movably supported along a groove, and when the holder is pressed by the paper during a jam, the holder moves along the groove such that the separation claw retracts by moving apart from the fixing roller.
However, in both JP 2002-14565A and JP 2002-145503A, the movement trajectory of the holder when the separation claw holder moves along the groove is on a single line, and the movement direction of the holder is prescribed to a single direction, and therefore sometimes the tip of the separation claw cannot retract when the holder or the separation claw is being pressed by the jammed paper, and at this time the tip of the separation claw strongly presses against the surface of the fixing roller, thereby causing damage to the surface of the fixing roller or damage to the peeling claw.
Accordingly, the present invention has been devised in consideration of the foregoing conventional problems, and it is an object thereof to provide a fixing device and an image forming apparatus including the same in which the peeling claw can be reliably retracted from the surface of the fixing roller during a jam.